Widow Rejects Pilot Error As Crash Cause

July 15, 1991|By KEN KAYE, Staff Writer

When Aero Coach Airlines Flight 2830 from Fort Lauderdale crashed in Treasure Cay in March, killing all five aboard, Bahamian firefighters did not have enough foam in their truck to put out the intense fire.

So they left and let the plane burn.

The flaming wreckage was not doused until about three hours later, when a member of the National Transportation Safety Board arrived from Miami and requested that firefighters return to the scene.

By that time, fire had consumed most of the evidence that could have helped investigators decipher what went wrong.

Nevertheless, the Bahamian government is blaming the crash on the pilot, Anthony Arthur Herbert, of West Palm Beach, saying he was traveling too slow when he banked the plane during the approach for landing, resulting in a stall.

``If the Bahamians had done their job, they might have known exactly what happened,`` said Cherie Herbert, a flight engineer on Boeing 727s for United Airlines.

She said she knows that her husband would have died in the crash, no matter what action the firefighters took. But she said they left investigators with nothing but circumstantial evidence.

She and Aero Coach pilots think Anthony Herbert`s plane was very likely hit by a bird.

Anthony Herbert, 48, a skilled pilot with 12,000 hours, took off at 9:25 a.m. on March 18 from Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport in an Aero Coach commuter plane. His four passengers included two men from Cleveland and a couple from Marsh Harbour, Bahamas.

The 10-seat Cessna 402C went down 65 minutes later into a heavily wooded area about three-quarters of a mile from the long runway of Treasure Cay in the Abacos.

Bahamian authorities say two firefighters struggled to get their truck to the burning wreckage, sprayed some foam, then retreated without reloading for another try.

Aidan Pynes, the Bahamian director of civil aviation and whose government conducted the accident investigation, conceded the firefighters were lax.

``They should have been sure the fire was out,`` he said.

But, he said, they did nothing wrong and did not hurt the investigation. ``After the thing had been burning for five or 10 minutes, there would be very little left.``

Pynes said Bahamian authorities reached the conclusion of pilot error based on a single witness, a local cab driver named Virgil Russell.

``The eyewitness saw the aircraft making an approach to land. The crosswind took it off the final approach course. The aircraft, in making a steep, slow bank, dived head first into the earth,`` Pynes said. ``If you go slow and you turn, you lose lift from the wings.``

Andy Alston, unit supervisor of the NTSB Miami office, confirmed that when he arrived on the scene several hours after the crash, the Bahamian firefighters had pulled their truck away from the fiery aircraft.

``When I arrived, I asked the local Bahamian airport manager to get the truck back out to the scene to put the fire out,`` Alston said.

Alston said he had to assist the firefighters with preparing the foam and identifying which parts of the plane to spray.

``Some of the evidence continued to burn during that time period,`` Alston said. ``Multiple parts of the aircraft burned.``

There was no device to record pilot conversation in the Cessna 402C, so all that investigators know is that both engines were running and the landing gear was in the process of being retracted into the plane at the time of the crash, Cherie Herbert said.

``Everything else is circumstancial evidence,`` said Cherie Herbert, 36, who lives in the house her husband purchased near West Palm Beach.

A thunderstorm rolled over Treasure Cay on the day of the accident, causing turbulent winds. But an Aero Coach pilot who landed a minute before the crash said the storm was no factor.

Russ Reichmann, of Pompano Beach, a pilot for 23 years, said he did not see the crash because he was deplaning passengers from his flight.

But he thinks Herbert`s plane was struck by a bird.

Herbert`s Cessna was traveling at about 140 mph. A bird would go right through the windscreen, which is a plane`s version of a windshield, Reichmann said.

``Knowing Tony, that`s the only thing that makes sense to me. He was a good pilot, a very cautious pilot. He had a lot of experience, both in that particular type of aircraft and flying the islands,`` he said.

Dick Knight, senior vice president of Aero Coach, said on Friday he had not seen the Bahamian accident report, which concluded that pilot error caused the plane to go down.

``That is their opinion,`` he said. ``We have our opinion. We know that Tony was a wonderful pilot.``

The crash began a series of struggles for Cherie Herbert.

The Bahamian authorities would not release Anthony Herbert`s remains until a positive identification was made through dental records. She was left to care for three of her husband`s four children from a previous marriage.

And Anthony Herbert`s insurance company is holding off paying a $100,000 life insurance policy until it finds a witness who saw him get on the airplane.

Then her father died on April 19, a month after the crash.

There have been a few good moments, though.

The Aero Coach pilots raised $800 for her family. And the small airline named its first and only Bandeirante, a commuter airliner, The Tony H., in Herbert`s memory.